Obsessed with digital culture: writing on film, TV, music, and the internet

mini

Near the end of last year, we released a little clip from an upcoming compilation of our first podcast season. I wrote about that in a short post here, where I spent more time introducing the concept. We look back on SCP1(our first season) with largely mixed opinions. Though inexperience makes it a difficult listen, there are some entertaining needles hidden in the haystack. We agreed that a more focused compilation of its stronger moments would be a far better introduction to our current podcasts than the season as a whole.…
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This piece is an extract from our first print zine, Issue #1: Birth. Click here for more information.

I can’t bear to harm a smiling face. A smiling face conceals a soul. A smiling face’s feelings are hurt when you mangle it. Eating it is bad enough, but throwing it away is reprehensible, and if I eat the smiling face it has at least served its life purpose.

That’s why I’m sitting, edge-of-my-seat, eye-on-the-clock, flicking through a plate of goldfish crackers to find the ones with faces so I can eat them and rescue them from the garbage. It is very horrible of the makers of goldfish crackers to put faces on some but not all of the goldfish.…
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Our first season of podcasts is something I try not to think about. We were incredibly naive, and many of our conversations meander into crushingly dull territory. As a result, we’ve noticed many curious listeners get no further than our first episode before running a mile. Frankly, I don’t blame them. I’m far more proud of SCP3, our current season, because of its accessible tone. After all, our debut podcast talk was a lengthy discussion about Star Trek; a fairly alienating topic.

It’s been some time since we’ve released an SCP Mini. Therefore, I may as well go over their concept once more before I introduce our latest. Using dialogue from our podcast episodes, Benjamin creates short, compressed versions set to edited footage. They allow us to focus on a particular subject, and accentuate key points and humour. In addition, they’re an excellent way for Benjamin to express his developing skill for video editing. Though they’ve only ever pulled in pathetically small view counts on our YouTube, they’re among our personal favourite content.

It seems that I lied in my previous post, intended as a sort of temporary finale. The idea was for that to be the last piece on Secret Cave until Issue #1: Birth sees release. I had a feeling that wouldn’t be the case. Too many things have happened that require a small update on the site itself. So, while Benjamin and I keep working on the zine, I thought I’d put this out as timely housekeeping. Incidentally, before I move into other territory, work on the zine has been a mixed bag. We’ve been coming out with some very strong results lately, and I can’t wait to make them public.…
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When I spoke to Doug Lussenhop last month, we got into a surreal internet standoff. It all started innocently, with a conversation about the addiction we all have to our phones. It’s true that all too much of our time is spent scrolling through infinite news feeds. Personally, I could be far more productive than I am by simply turning off my phone. We’re all guilty of it in certain respects, with Lussenhop combating it by spending dedicated time, in the sticks, away from social media. For me, as someone who needs to learn lessons in a similar fashion to a hamster, more direct incentive is necessary.…
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For our latest SCP Mini (compressed editions of our regular podcasts), we’ve used our interview with Dan Renton Skinner as a source. As someone with a wealth of experience within British comedy, he had much to say on the subject. I took particular interest, when speaking to him, in the anarchic nature of certain comedies of the early 90’s. Thanks to his widespread work with Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, it’s something he clearly understands. In more modern times, some of the punk has disappeared from our national humorists. As Skinner himself notes, they simply don’t allow that aesthetic on syndicated television anymore.…
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For this SCP Mini, we haven’t drawn from outside materials or our interview guests. Instead, for the first time, we’ve used clips from our very first season of podcasts. Within that season, we were a rather different beast. Season Two almost entirely consists of interviews with other creatives about their work. In our first episodes, Benjamin and I simply recorded casual conversations about pre-set topics. It was a very formative time for us, but I still feel there are some interesting relics there. It makes for the most entertaining listening when the two of us argued, which would usually feature my explosive temper.…
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This week saw the release of two more SCP Minis; compressed editions of our podcasts curated by Benjamin. In these, we’ve drawn from interviews we conducted with David Liebe Hart and Professor Elemental. In certain ways, these act as short-form signposts to the original conversations. That said, we try wherever we can to make sure they stand on their own. Because our guests are often so insightful on a variety of topics, much of their commentary is comfortable in its own context. However, sometimes a guest can be so enigmatic, as a whole, that grander threads appear in their dialogue:

This week, Benjamin brought out an SCP Mini based around his interview with Stefan Bohacek. As the founder of BotWiki, he’s someone with an impressive knowledge on the nature of artificial intelligence. In this video, he highlights an interesting phenomenon. Pareidolia is the force in our minds which makes us see faces in toast, or on the surface of Mars. When applied to interaction with bots, it can have a profound impact on our perspectives. Despite knowing that an AI is a construct, with clear limits to its capability, we can easily project humanity onto them regardless.